Saturday, March 17, 2012

The Cruise to Aruba - Oranjestad, Aruba

The approach to Oranjestad, Aruba

We
slept with the balcony door open and the air conditioning off.
Really nice to wake up to nothing but cool, ocean air. I dressed and headed up
top to watch the sunrise and the approach to Aruba, and was fortunate
to catch one of those golden sunrises you see in travel brochures
just as we approached the city of Oranjestad, Aruba.

The narrowness of the channel is obvious: The Crown Princess is berthed at Aruba.

I was
dumfounded by the narrowness of the channel as we approached the dock
and the angle of the approach to it. This pilot was going to earn
his money or we were going to look like the Costa Concordia. The
Paardenbaai Channel is only 270 meters wide, about 885 feet. In
other words, the ship couldn't possibly turn around in the channel
because the Crown Princess, at 953 feet, is considerably longer the
the channel is wide! And the channel has a bend in the middle to
boot! Fascinated, I watched as the Crown Princess confidently sailed
right up to the wharf where the ship's thrusters took over and pushed
us up gently against the bumpers. If you weren't watching, you would
have no idea we had arrived and docked. By 7:57am, we were secured
at Cruise Terminal “C” in Oranjestad.

The welcome terminal in Oranjestad, Aruba

As
soon as the announcement was made about disembarking, we went to
breakfast. We used the forward gang-plank after eating at the open
buffet, and after checking out of the ship with our room cards,
walked to the welcome center that everyone passes through to access
the buses and taxis waiting to hustle people anywhere they want to
go. The sign hanging over the exit to the buses says, “Welcome to
Aruba, One Happy Island.” I thought to myself, “We'll soon
see!”

As
best we can tell, the sign was right. Again, the people we met were
warm, friendly and easy going. Not everyone we met in town spoke
English, but there was no problem as someone spoke the language or
its close approximation in just about every store we stopped.
Doesn't matter, smiles and a little courtesy do wonders here. Our
first serious stop was the Kong Hing Supermercado grocery store to
pick up water and munchies to sustain us as we wandered around side
streets and local shops before heading back to the main vendor areas
along the waterfront. After fantasy stops at Diesel and other
European outlets, and one pharmacy, we slowly headed back toward the
port.

There
are lots of typical bars that appeal to the carefully maintained
image of Caribbean abandon and lack of sobriety that appeals to the
sunshine and alcohol deprived vacationers from up north. These
places must look better in the dark. We stopped at one for about
three minutes before moving on to one that was closer to the water
and further from the greasy kitchen odors. Pigeons wandered around
the floor of the restaurant we finally selected and yellow finches
freely flew through the outside seating area, landing to serenade
patrons from the power lines strung for the lights. The Heineken
beer I had was three dollars cheaper than the Budweiser I had on the
ship back on day one.

There
is one side trip here I would like to do, so perhaps someday we'll
return just to take the submarine trip, if nothing else. Atlantis
submarines offers underwater tours in a real, Coast Guard approved
submarine just off shore from Oranjestad. Kind of a real glass
bottomed boat tour, well, glass sided boat tour anyway. We saw the
submarine as it was being towed into position to accept guests and it
appeared to be a well done operation. Just something to think about
for next time.